Happy Endings Is the New and Improved Community

While Community triesdesperately and mostly fails to get back on the air, last night's season-three premiere of Happy Endings on ABC has confirmed its status as that show's best contender, the new most offbeat mainstream show on television. The plots aren't as high-concept as Community (though, to be fair, a man drugging a woman in a full upper-body cast in order to sleep with her physical therapist is still pretty high-concept), but that's a good thing: Community was so niche, with its zombie attacks and My Dinner with Andre homage, that it alienated, well, basically everyone, save for its tiny pool of slavishly devoted fans, who relished in its inaccessibility.

More From Esquire

Happy Endings takes a different tack. It seizes on the joy viewers get from feeling in on the barrage of pop-culture jokes (a couple of last night's gems: "Chris Bosh looks like one of Omar's boyfriends on The Wire." "You two have been talking like Scott Caan's groomsmen.") while keeping the references broad enough that people actually get them. It makes the show seems like it's flouting the rules when it's really playing by them. A neat trick, and Happy Endings pulls it off with the same dexterity of its character Brad (Damon Wayans Jr.) singing "Ebony and Ebony" with his puppet Sinbrad. Watch him in this compilation of only jokes from the season premiere — context is unnecessary when you have an African-American marionette.